Produsage is a new term that includes the audience as people who now produce and use content. According to Axel Bruns produsage is “a model of describing today’s emerging user-led content creation environments…and offers new ways of understanding the collaborative content creation and development practices found in contemporary informational environments.”
The four characteristics of produsage are-
– Organisational shift- shift from individuals as producers to a larger and broader based distribution of content by a community of people
– Fluid movement- movement of produsers from being a leader, to a participate and user of the content
– Unfinished- the work is always unfinished and constantly being re developed or developing
– Permissive regimes- includes issues of ownership, employ copyright systems for authorship but it enables a continued collaboration on further content
So where does YouTube fit into all of this? YouTube over the years has changed dramatically. People were uploading videos individually, that revolved about them and the theme of their video. An organisational shift occurred where YouTubers were now collaborating with other YouTubers creating a shift from individuals to groups. There are also whole YouTube channels that make videos with multiple YouTubers such as Daily Mix that is a “new beauty and makeover YouTube channel… that is hosted by some of the UK’s biggest YouTube stars including Pixiwoo, Tanya Burr, Wayne Goss, Jim Chapman and Ruth Crilly.”
Daily Mix can also be used as part of the fluid movement, where the YouTubers are acting as the leaders who organise the videos, the producers who make the video and participate as part of user content.
As for unfinished work and permissive regimes, YouTube as a whole covers those characteristics. Videos are made weekly, the channels themselves are constantly developing and as more viewers are accumulated the opportunities for the YouTuber become endless. YouTube also has its own copyright laws and issues of ownership mentioned in my blog post This video has been removed
YouTube is a great platform where Dr Axel Bruns characteristics for produsage are demonstrated and developed.
Until next week…
References:
Bruns, A 2007, Produsage: Towards a Broader Framework for User-Led Content Creation, Proceedings Creativity & Cognition 6, Washington, DC, viewed 9th April 2014
Natasha Nikoloska 